


The Competition

by MoreHuman



Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Asexual Katsuki Yuuri, Asexual Relationship, Asexuality Spectrum, Canon Compliant, Feelings, Introspection, M/M, asexual intimacy, competition is love, how many other ways can I tag this as ace content lol
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-15
Updated: 2021-02-15
Packaged: 2021-03-17 10:07:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,330
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29469957
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MoreHuman/pseuds/MoreHuman
Summary: Viktor knows the shape of this program backwards and forwards, can breathe along with the ebb and flow of it. He dreams about it. He’s been dreaming about it for months. Years, maybe, in one way or another. But now there’s something different. That glint of gold.Some Viktor introspection during Yuuri’s final free skate.
Relationships: Katsuki Yuuri/Victor Nikiforov
Comments: 8
Kudos: 50





	The Competition

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ICMezzo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ICMezzo/gifts).



> Surprise, Mezzo! Though… you can’t actually be surprised, right? What did you think would happen, you would introduce me to these soft boys becoming better versions of themselves, wearing each other’s rings, and I would, what, _not_ write feelings about them? Yeah. So this is a not-surprise surprise. Consider it a thank you for being in my life and bringing these two with you.
> 
> This unbeta’d work is my first time writing these characters and my first time writing for a non-English canon ever, so please be gentle.

The music starts. The movements are familiar by now.

Viktor knows the shape of this program backwards and forwards, can breathe along with the ebb and flow of it. He dreams about it. He’s been dreaming about it for months. Years, maybe, in one way or another. But now there’s something different. That glint of gold.

Yuuri extends his right hand over his head and his ring catches the light, throwing it in all directions. Viktor doesn’t look down, he knows better than to look away, but he imagines the ring on his own right hand catching that same light right back. Receiving it. It’s not the first time Yuuri has let some part of himself shine out, but it has the same effect it always does. He draws Viktor in.

The first time was at the banquet after last year’s Final, probably. Yuuri stumbled up to him, drunk and slurring something about a hot spring. He asked Viktor to be his coach. To everyone else there it was nonsense, an outclassed skater forgetting his place and embarrassing himself in front of true talent. To Viktor, it made perfect, instant sense. He looked down into Yuuri’s wide, glossed-over eyes and understood, _Oh, you’re like me._ Here was a competitor so crushed by losing that he couldn’t even talk about it. Meanwhile Viktor knew himself to be a competitor so crushed by winning that he couldn’t even talk about it.

They recognized each other. No one else saw it. But they did.

Yuuri completes his first jump combination easily and moves through his footwork with effortless grace. He’ll tell any interviewer who asks that he learned this way of moving from years of watching Viktor compete, but that’s not the full story. The full story is that every person skating today spent years watching Viktor compete. And none of them move like this.

Yuuri doesn’t remember that moment at the banquet, apparently, but his body remembered. His body didn’t forget. That’s what Viktor saw when he first watched that viral video of Yuuri skating to “Stay Close to Me.” An imitation, the headlines called it, but Viktor knew better. He’s been imitated many times, but this was—this was being _captured_. This was being understood. Of course he quit everything on the spot to go be a part of that. How could he not?

How can he go back?

Yuuri lands his quad salchow aggressively, decisively, and that’s one move Viktor won’t get credit for. Yurio lit that fire in him.

Yurio isn’t up here watching, Yakov wouldn’t allow that, but Viktor knows he’s downstairs warming up, listening to the crowd, and silently cheering Yuuri on. Later, when his part is over, Yuuri will watch his rival skate. He’ll shout “Davai!” along with everyone else, and he’ll mean it. They’ll each want the other to do his best so that they’re both forced to do their best. That’s how competition works. It’s a push and pull with and against someone else. It requires a partner.

Suddenly it’s not just the glint of gold that’s different. Viktor watches the expected path of Yuuri’s skates on the ice, one foot in front of the other, and then suddenly the pattern breaks. It’s not a fall, not disaster. Yuuri digs his toe pick in for what was supposed to be a triple loop and makes it a flip, landing on his opposite foot, reaching for those extra points and getting them. His right arm stretches out for balance and finds that golden light.

Viktor thought he knew how it would go, showing up in Japan, deciding to make himself Yuuri’s coach. Being naked in the hot spring when Yuuri found him hadn’t exactly been part of the plan, but it wasn’t _not_ part of the plan, either. Because that was another part of what they recognized in each other that night at the banquet—desire. Viktor has spent his whole life being desired; he knows it when he sees it.

But nothing with Yuuri went the way Viktor thought it would. From that very first day, he was more flustered by Viktor’s presence, by his _interest_ than by his nude body. Even as his cheeks burned with the intensity of his admiration, his gaze didn’t linger on skin or muscle.

Viktor’s instincts in love and seduction are as finely honed as his skating instincts. Get the angle right, get the approach right, find the right speed, and success falls into place. One move follows the next. But not with Yuuri. He declined almost every advance Viktor made, but it was never rejection. He found his own way through and pulled Viktor with him. Yuuri has still never accepted the word _boyfriend_ , or even a kiss, and yet here Viktor is wearing the ring he received while church bells rang, the most precious gold he’s ever won.

Yuuri’s a genius who never fails to surprise.

He does it again. He puts an extra rotation into his next jump and lands it, and Viktor sees what he’s doing. He’s making this a four quad program. He’s coming for Viktor’s level of difficulty. He’s coming for his record. Viktor has never loved him more.

Viktor knows exactly what he wants when he looks at Yuuri’s body, which is beautiful and powerful and transfixing. He’s never stopped wanting it. But discovering what they get to have together instead? It’s better than anything Viktor could want.

Part of what they get to share is this—skating, competing, bodily expressing the desire to challenge, to grow, to win. Yuuri’s short program was about imitation, playing a character. His interpretation of Eros is unique, but it’s not authentic. This free skate isn’t a character. It’s just Yuuri expressing what he loves, what he wants. Apparently tonight what Yuuri wants is to break Viktor’s record. They both want him to break it. If he does...

When he does, Viktor will go back to competing. Of course he will. How could he not? He can’t leave Yuuri alone in this. He knows Yuuri won’t leave him alone in it either. And that means it won’t be going back at all, not with Yuuri there to remind him why he loves it, to banish the crushing weight that always used to find him at the top of the podium. They’ll push and pull each other forward. They’ll keep loving each other every way they can think of.

The final quad is Viktor’s signature move and now it’s Yuuri’s, too. He lands it perfectly, and Viktor can sense the exhaustion beneath his closing spins. It’s invisible to everyone else, but it’s there. Viktor can feel it like it’s in his own bones. His body remembers the exhilaration of measuring out every last ounce of his effort and spending it all.

Yuuri finds his final pose as the music ends, then breaks into a yell of celebration as the crowd roars. Then he’s in Viktor’s arms. 

Not that Viktor has a non-favorite time to hold Yuuri, but this is his very favorite of all the favorites. This moment between the ice and the kiss and cry, when Yuuri’s still wrung out from exertion and before the tension of waiting sets in, this moment belongs to them. Yuuri shivers, and he pants, and he smells like sweat, and it makes Viktor want… this. Exactly this.

When he grips Yuuri’s shoulder, Viktor catches the flash of his own ring in the light, and that’s familiar now, too. Getting more familiar all the time. Yuuri still denies that they’re wedding rings, or engagement rings, or that they represent any kind of transformational promise. But they do represent commitment. Commitment to gratitude, to each other, to a future of growing this love between them without trying to turn it into something else. Viktor isn’t sure where that leads, but he knows what’s next.

He takes Yuuri’s left hand in his right, gold kissing skin. He squeezes, and leads them forward.


End file.
